mggm59

<p>Seems just intended to fix a rare GPS problem. Much ado about nothing.</p>

<p>Ended up buying and replacing, piece of cake.</p>

<p>I had the 50-135 and the Sigma 70-200 (old model) and after thoroughly comparing them I gave away the first, similar optical performance, shorter reach. But it's way lighter.</p>

<p>@MlM, normally I go around with two bodies, so today they are:<br>

k5 with 12-24 for higher resolution and distortion correction<br>

k20 with 28-80 (to be replaced? by 24-90 or 17-70) sometimes swapped with the 80-200<br>

I did not know about the Sigma, but the additional 30mm seem to me more important than f2.8.</p>

<p>@MK, I just sold the 18-55 exactly because it isn't WR. And I am selling the 18-135, it's not my type of lens, I ended up not using it much, probably I'll look for a 18-55WR for wet occasions</p>

<p>@ME, about the use, I do mostly travel photos (plus some aircraft photos at airshows since I am also an aviation buff), but not much of people because I have a sort of block in taking unauthorized pics.</p>

<p>@AG, thanks for the info, looks like the 24-90 is a good candidate indeed, and being much cheaper than the 17-70 it looks like a no brainer, So the real competition remains the 28-80... listening also to JS. It is a fact that 400€ on top make it easier to swallow... Ideally I should have both lenses for a couple of days, but I think the swap (if the guy decides, he did not answer yet) will not allow enough time, as I would need to do it while traveling through Luxembourg with 7 more hours to drive in front of me (and my wife, which is worse).</p>

<p>Well, a piece of plastic 41 euros (53$)... crazy. I'd rather see if I can fix it (and possibly make it stronger) before shelling out the dough.</p>

<p>I have already posted in the past on the subject, but reached no firm conclusions, so here I am again, pondering what to do now that I have some real alternatives and not just theoretical ones.<br>

I own a Pentax 28-70 f2.8FA* and I consider it not perfectly suited to complement the 12-24. Apart from its weight and having f2.8 aperture, I see little benefit in keeping it vs either a 24-90 or a 17-70. Should I need the thin depth of field I can use the 50 f1.4, so nothing really lost here, I am not too much into portrait anyway. And I also have the 70 mm f2.8 of the Sigma 70-200, if needed, so the only area which would not be covered is the wide angle side, where thin depth of field is less relevant, particularly on digital.<br>

The new fact is that I have a possible offer to swap the 28-70 with a 24-90 plus 400€ (about 520$, how do you rate this offer?)<br>

I tested 28-70's performance, and at f5.6 or 8 it does not seem to be much better (except maybe a little less contrast in color rendition) than the humble but much more modern kit 18-55 II. <br>

I could not find instead a comparison with the 24-90 or the 17-70. From the few reviews (with real tests, not subjective ones) I found I could gather that the 24-90 is very good, but how much in comparison with the 28-70? And the 17-70 seems also relatively good (but I have the impression a bit less than both previous ones), but it would benefit from the in camera processing applied by the K5, while I doubt the 24-90 would (any ideas about this?). I see the benefits of this processing on the 12-24, 18-55 and 18-135, and I have in principle the intention of bringing gradually all my lenses to the standard needed to benefit from it.<br>

Any experience is welcome, thanks in advance.</p>

 

<p>Thanks a lot to all, I'll contact Pentax Italy and Belgium tomorrow. I removed the screws and the job inside seems also easy, although the thin wires make me nervous anyway...</p>

<p>Thanks Alan, but does Pentax sell spares or would I have to ship it back and wait weeks (not to mention the cost?).<br>

Jeremiah, the warranty is gone unfortunately, and I would guess they would blame it on me anyway(which might be for turning the lever too hard, but then they should design it better...)</p>

<p>Picture (error when loading previous post)</p><div></div>

<p>My faithful flash has a broken foot. One of the thin plastic slabs that enter the shoe just broke away, leaving me with a barely usable flash (it still stays in place, but one cannot move the whole camera-flash group around too fast). There are four screws above it, as can be seen in the picture, so I guess it is easily removable, but I did not try yet. Did anybody have similar issues? Or know where to find spares? Or have any idea for a DIY intervention? <br>

Thanks in advance<br>

Maurizio</p>

<p>Unfortunately I have the same issue on a K5 with a Pentax 12-24 I paid 700€, and before this one I had another (replaced by Pentax) that had different focus left and right. <br>

This means that one can have right AF on one side of the focal excursion with the right autofocus correction (in my case is around -5) but not on the other (where it would need to be +3 or 4), or have teh extremes slightly out of focus and chose an average value.<br>

Also, on this and other wide angle zooms, I see that it does not reach perfect focus at infinity, just because the available excusion AFTER the infinity mark is not enough in some conditions (it bangs the focus ring upon reaching the end stop and beeps that it cannot focus, I lost a lot of shots because of this).<br>

If I remember correctly I had the same problem when I tested them on a K20, so it could seem to be the lens, but I also had a K10 (actually 2, both with the same problem, Pentax refused a refund because according to them it was within their tolerances) which could not focus properly with a manual focus 50 f1.4 A. My conclusion is that the focus plane, due to the stabilization mechanism, has some tolerances that can vary greatly from one camera to the other, and the lens cannot cope. The problem of different focus at the two ends is probably a different issue which might be lens related, or AF related, or both.<br>

I would call all this annoying if it were cheap stuff: on a total of 2000€ of equipment (and the same happens on a 28-80 f2.8 FA* worth even more when it was new) it's something I cannot define in polite company.</p>

<p>Unfortunately I have the same issue on a K5 with a Pentax 12-24 I paid 700€, and before this one I had another (replaced by Pentax) that had different focus left and right. <br>

This means that one can have right AF on one side of the focal excursion with the right autofocus correction (in my case is around -5) but not on the other (where it would need to be +3 or 4), or have teh extremes slightly out of focus and chose an average value.<br>

Also, on this and other wide angle zooms, I see that it does not reach perfect focus at infinity, just because the available excusion AFTER the infinity mark is not enough in some conditions (it bangs the focus ring upon reaching the end stop and beeps that it cannot focus, I lost a lot of shots because of this).<br>

If I remember correctly I had the same problem when I tested them on a K20, so it could seem to be the lens, but I also had a K10 (actually 2, both with the same problem, Pentax refused a refund because according to them it was within their tolerances) which could not focus properly with a manual focus 50 f1.4 A. My conclusion is that the focus plane, due to the stabilization mechanism, has some tolerances that can vary greatly from one camera to the other, and the lens cannot cope. The problem of different focus at the two ends is probably a different issue which might be lens related, or AF related, or both.<br>

I would call all this annoying if it were cheap stuff: on a total of 2000€ of equipment (and the same happens on a 28-80 f2.8 FA* worth even more when it was new) it's something I cannot define in polite company.</p>

<p>I have the 1.7x Pentax AF and it works optically relatively well, while mechanically it has some limits, since I have to sort of prefocus manually the 300mm FA 4.5 since the focus excursion of the multiplier is not sufficient. I can provide some test pics if needed.<br>

I also have the old Sigma 80-200 f2.8 EX and its dedicated 2x, I can provide some pics also for that. The coupling is mechanically perfect (although there are now some problems with the electri contacts), the results are reasonably good, but there are more lenses in the path and it shows a bit on contrast and aberrations vs the 300mm.</p>

<p>I use an old (pre 2000, and possibly pre 1995) Sigma EX 80-200 f2.8 with its dedicated 2x without any problem. Seem B****t to me too.</p>

<p>Thanks for sharing the info on the 5000 ED, which are disheartening on such a new machine, I own one and my gripe with Nikon is such that I will never consider a Nikon product of any type due to their unqualifiable behavior on such a professional piece of equipment.<br>

They had the guts to suggest I buy Silverfast when it has been their choice (on economic grounds I am sure) to discontinue support, and they should have factored in providing an alternative themselves, not just asking a customer who paid almost 2000 $ (including accessories such as the auto feeder) to shell out a few hundreds more. I kept a windows xp bootcamp partition in my mac to keep using the old sw, but sooner or later I know it will become unsupported too, and then my curse on Nikon will turn to "Death to those who decided it" ;-).<br>

BTW, nice to know you are from Macau, been there one year ago, very nice place!</p>

 

<p>I felt the same for a long time, and I do not undervalue the dark side of digital in terms of archiving, for instance, but after waiting for years to jump ship, I have now the same attitude I have for LPs, valve amplifiers and other retro passions. I still have a light table in my work room, but the 26" screen in front of it with Aperture is such a convenient alternative to digging into boxfuls of slides, dealing with dust, scanning (and curse Nikon for not supporting people who spent almost 2000$ with decent software for the latest OS, no more Nikons in my house), labeling and archiving manually etc.<br>

Mind you, all of us who used film have a common attitude, that might have been a bit spoiled by certain "conveniences" of digital (I'll fix it later) but affects our way of working even with digital. I surely see a lot of difference with those who were born, photographically speaking, in the digital era. There I can see the point of going back to analogue for some time. Here in Belgium photography schools start with film, and there is surely a good reason for this. But then they go on to photoshop.<br>

Sure, there might still be a slight difference in quality, but by the time you scan it you already lose a bit. And modern "digital" lenses are almost invariably so much better (and with electronic distortion and aberration control, even more so in the future) that global quality might end up being on a par. I keep a few film cameras (MX, Z1, Nikonos), and some film, but I am not sure I'll use them, except maybe for underwater use. </p>

 

<p>It feels "condensed", more solid, better refined, and slightly smaller. Being 1.9m tall with big hand (but with thin fingers) it is ok for me, I do not know for someone with chubbier hands/fingers, it might get crowded). Having had both of the previous ones, the positioning of the buttons takes some getting accustomed to, and since I still use the K20 as a second body for teles, it's a bit of a chore. The new card port is instead definitely better.</p>

<p>Neither I use DXO, in camera is more than enough, I keep it always on and I am gradually moving all my lenses (zooms more than primes) to those compatible with the correction. I expect this to bring even better optical results by becoming a given in lens design. One or two more generations and then it will be on all Pentax cameras, and then specialized lenses will start to appear in which designers can assume these distortions will be taken care of in SW and will concentrate on other performance like sharpness, or lens size and cost (most likely the latter...)</p>

<p>Update done, no improvement. I have now tested all my cards after the update, and approximately half work. No pattern, in two cases one of two identical cards work and the other not, from 2 to 16GB. Crazy</p>

<p>@ME: Thanks, actually not, but it has worked with these cards for years... nevertheless, the fact that teh only one that works is a normal SD might mean something...<br>

@MM: does yours work with some cards and some not too?</p>

<p>Even funnier: I dug out a brand new, unopened card, and it did not work either. After trying four or five more, an old 2GB Class 2 Sandisk works! I could format it, stick it in and out and it keeps working. So it's not the contacts, or nothing should work. Is it maybe not liking cards which are SDHC, or that have been in the K5 (envy?)<br>

I'll try reformatting on teh K5 or the Panasonic TZ7 to see if it makes any difference.</p>

<p>Hallo<br>

On Sunday I took my K20D from the backpack (it has normally the 80-200 on, the K5 takes most of the wide angle action, i.e. 80% of my pictures when city touring) and when I put in a card it gives an error. I change the card, same error: "Memori Card Error". Same when I try to format it.<br>

I tried puting the card in and out a few times to see if some friction could take some oxidation away from the pins. Nothing.<br>

Any idea of what else can I do? Are a few drops of disoxidising spray on card contacts harmful? I am afraid of intervening on the pins inside the camera directly given the narrow available space.<br>

All suggestions welcome. Not the nicest thing to discover a few days before holidays...</p>

<p>Right Douglas... when it is open is a funny looking starfish, with 10 arms instead of 5 (but basically they branch off from where normally one comes out, so it has the same type of structure). And the way it divides, and divides and finally has sort of vines at the end of each last twig... As soon as it saw my light (we were at 40 m or so) it extended an arm towards me... I post another from farther away before he sensed me</p><div></div>

<p>And here, a small quiz. Who's this guy (what type of animal, that is) and who's doing what to whom</p><div></div>

<p>... and a lesser known one</p><div></div>